A Word on Words; 3831; Ridley Wills II

these are liz from nashville studio way celebrating offers literature and ideas for more than three decades this is word on workers with jobs ellen johnson gordon welcome once again to word on words that welcome back an old friend number of owners who've lost our families really wields his passion for local history is inspiring to chronicle said his life and times in several books including it is true that on the plantation and during tennessee a postcard that are among the animated talk about the anti george allen tennessee's first million dollar girl and highlights israel ago

and it's this is both famous and infamous really welcome once again the world were like you're john i'm pleased to be back to talk about this so this means the decision by any standard song is all markov ms costa county and the senate and not only your own narrative bought from a wonderful photographs a chronically early days the days in which it was deteriorating and it was closed and then its rebirth thought we might begin the first all just talking a little bit about what did inspire really wills to go into the history of alarm well when i was a boy and up our go downtown maybe when my mother were shopping downing street and loved ones and shooting him recently rebuild the damaged awards and the frog get back into an hour ago in

the lobby and looked at the deal would get all paintings six of the civil war but it's a lot of hours of that damage in the civil war the confederacy so i love with and those paintings level of that hotel ever since well you have pictures of repressive of the historic paintings no longer there now a national museum in atlanta in birmingham but they are marvelous pictures then i thought we might just hello review of the first picture causes is that lobby as it exists today and it's beautiful truly beautiful photograph it's one of the my favorite rooted in a shortage is just marvelous and it always reminds me of a russian fabricated because of all those those colors then you know both the number of

women look for indifferent when the skylight was so black you didn't realize it was blessed the first thing i do when i walk into that but that's because it sort of reminds me of on another time when it was not quite so beautiful mr ghosh than mom was picture was taken about nineteen sixty and our friend come which they go oh it's the original of this picture and he literally and down he said to me how this truce a renewal of britain's international women's pics to articulate our slow to get it because the contrast between it and the far places there today is just remarkable life and the next witness in this is the ballroom where the art portraits of tennessee's three pressures hang in it hadn't changed a great deal since that opening night in september nineteen teens by a lot of those

singing amen amen a historic events many presidents have spoken to crowds and she grabs in the ballroom woodrow wilson william howard taft all the jackson dave douglas early in the twentieth century were held in this moment with this is one of the contemporary suite simpson all sweet hotel that day and has been on since song foolish korea's thirty years and the next one this is the rule room this is actually a postcard of my own that was taken in nineteen ten and i put in the book to show the contrast between it and the next picture which shows that room today in those one forges so distinguish that because this is where francis craig and his orchestra and on this is the men's bathroom that died in two thousand

eight was our but i had to be the best bet from the united states is still a great place to live one of the art deco truth about this picture him because when the hotel opened in nineteen ten except for opening night women were not allowed in the lobby and there's a picture of the lobby measures to say there's only minimal one of the nominees to saddam women were not allowed a lot of what they were allowed in the ballroom much later where these girls were and this is when i see this bridge i think of bob dylan dismissed wife who met bob dudley smith when he was a sports hero and dance in the ballroom didn't win with a place for every minute franzen and i'm addicted and right and the next the view from the capitol believe in the capital and you can see on the hermitage to write a hit on the

left and good friday is the ymca which opened in nineteen twelve and now when they started planned both those photos that was an alley between the two in the city wide and in the cab the boulevard in college the ymca do have to have a lot of extra money to redesign their world in the next picture isn't includes mentions on sex everywhere most people enter today are one hotel was built there was a separate infringe on u street village for ladies because unless they whisk or they couldn't come in the main fish as recent phenomenon isn't theirs them i guess that's the most infamous guests were added in african beats without a little bit and i'm john dillon who dusted but this is our component here he shows up haven't come down the dixie highway in nineteen twenty eight

and a bulletproof car with shatterproof glass when she you know and tires that would want for that is that every precaution the good on the wagers forty mentioned fourteen was dayton for them but let's move on gene autry and his thoughts and there's a source in the lobby redskin actually i think they stayed in an x because that was a four four rooms but that picture is in the hotel today somebody was opening a promotion that was a lot that a lot of that would not admit women finally admits the horse trigger and the whole soul of the big dogs in the next day to believe oh that's the height of the civil rights movement and the administration and the demonstrations outside the hotel and you can see the marquis flotilla grocery this would have been the summer of nineteen sixty one on the civil rights

demonstration guarding all the art gun stores on fifth avenue would cross keys was also in their sights as it was the region in its own right and here's this is on the summer of nineteen twenty and i believe these ladies all of the aunties self and yet they're opposed to as a violation of state right there's a lot of the stuff in the book you tell him about the book is chock full of anecdotes but there's one about an hour show and great leader of the knife american wounds of the soldiers are showing up expecting an automobile taker the delay in the car and i guess the phrase or goes out except telegrams in his sports car one ngo that i was one always a pioneer in his balls and bikes are even cheaper he thought she was really worried

aggressive with demand that he come over the turban he introduced her to raise grateful for good leader and i think he took the stage after an unusual political revolution it might be another photograph to him the truth this was really is only photo that the investors in the hundred word about of the tulane off or in a big concern to them and neither was the er darkened hotel but the metro this scene is really years after its heyday decades after its heyday and like its christmas day in nineteen sixty one and i wanted bernard lewis says mosso friends who was up at the hotel in that late eighties and early nineties and who have approved a lawyer and when he would be his will award blamed blue you have a card that said you have been

beaten by the greatest ostling little muscles that he had that the move a local muslims invaded and it was a huge eye garner edwards oh maria was there one time and on i have begun to grow room when minnesota fats they go to live in the picture was among the president is nixon years and to call is shown on the left and that allow sports coat and a manager who was a manager there for for good many years it was and it was really undone and there is the person i think through more thoughtful in my over the creation of a pill robert meyer only when a favela the creation but at least in nineteen thirteen has only been three years old and he asked he release all that hotel until his death in nineteen forty six really made great animated great he did

kill his death in nineteen forty six then we go through that period which goto goes down down down through a young and let's take a ticket would it look like that i guess that's one restoration of beginning to get a deeper sense of a sound better or us from this is that isn't this stairway going down to the groom i mean it shows the porch baby was there latent living in the hotel and the door or six avenue are so warped that you couldn't the blockade and there have been numerous listeners know these shows i said it was that came post been torn down or the great thing was that it was well it came very close to being torn down and then made another factor too all of the of all of the

tumors would go like you know when i think about the number of times i've his photo when it was really overgrown townhouse as opposed for authentic fortunes of those riches mayor so we just became necessary to declare in and save the day and he did and then maybe doubling and merchants or commissioned by hand and brought all the people and to show my the great speeches in which he really challenge the city get on itself and savers photo from being torn down the store they would actually design what was going to replace the hotel parking lot in hospital services go move down there and they were put there big sun on top of the building in the flow through it and then got a hotel comes in

an end jc bradford enters into pencil is a voter and i don't think it was about a happier when it was a given that for him that's you know a little bit about the president's ideas taft was first the tariff came off woodrow wilson came back in nineteen eleven and he didn't spend the night and they're trying to get back in his special card and installation and went on down to the river to the south we spoke the next day this was our woodrow wilson came woodrow wilson's brother was buried in nineteen twenty seven o'clock for their follow joe wilson was hitler's school of theology ed southwest and christian college there's no

roads in college a message to end up maybe one of the reasons that wilson who was just emerging as a candidate for president and president was governor new jersey came was his brother was a reporter for the ballot and when they picked him up in his basement to conclude bros after just one sixteenth century with what those to visit for the moment it seems to me that it was and deciding to stay their own at the madrassa you say this rosa marked the transition now its gonna be learned to jazz nationally known to lower them actual out to just joining us some thought was really wilson about his latest book mating when you think about it all these years later that that site have been saved reserve and is today the jewel of absolute rule john our day it's one

story before we got closer to some of the nineteen twenties and that fight research by voting to run the nineteenth amendment giving women the right to vote was coming up the following monday and on saturday a group of oil he owed national might and are got a hold of them as unable to have a reception to sign for legislators him in violence from voting against this monstrous even giving women the right to vote and long and four and then a young legislative someone who later became a prominent laureate and columbia who we both knew are with left that there's really low and as you walk downstairs he said to a friend that group of dangers long long pedigree in short on looks in the group the women i was shocked and that was the empire's senate and then you look at that photograph the beauty of and

our family and our two children down with the studio's as that label goes to the end is up for an hour says she made him so she has a certain pitchers aren't complaining and guilt and it is absolutely a virgin in order well of course i've restored enough picture president nixon and that's a very very large sum lyndon johnson the jack kennedy i think in there and so it's it's not a jimmy hoffa stayed there you've included that list of famous and infamous people in say they're mature tell which aired a great deal to you also list all the managers dr seek them out as usual i mean you give us a detail or your books generally that was great detail on the incident won't set i guess your sense of history

about the city you understand that there are so many people who were not looking back anthony given something more than just the narrative more than just the photographs and i act auckland town that list of claims an infamous people adore swanson was there the career so story is the order was at historic they put an arm of the type that that the manager of her did refuse to give caruso who's performed at the grand ole opry hatch i am the law moratorium pass a nice mattress and the manager was indignant said listen our human crusoe at matches of investment fraud gloria swanson show the no she performing in nashville which had with that well she was she was you know a silent movies on oh yeah

palin has shaken not sure where she was way past a primal and india was a teenager working on the desk and the new shoes she was and she said oh misfortune you most wonderful actress and the whole world and she looked at him says you abortion the whole world were to you know the one story after another that sort of brings history history alive when you think about france's great well chapter on francis crick it you know there was a time when the human wake up in the morning in here and here you can and with bob lamb voice and france greatest orchestras francisco it was almost as much an inspiration sun lot of the hotel so what a marriage that was it was great artist played and the villain in have drawn to the grand ole opry

and therefore had three syndicated show john gone across the nation all the city outside of new york at that beasley smith and his orchestra from andrew jackson francis creighton is all from the hermitage grand ole opry sponsored by a prince albert to back the three that were killed it was a great crew for douglas elementary and when you think about france's current noted there was not a it was not i am in his heyday there was not a single dance in nashville which those who put on a game they had to get france's great painfully forty hours sleep in the last crate had a day be part of that in the late thirties a pithy on the only country club in the very next day you might not true for ford had a debut

john party for historically who didn't want to go but scientists created a new level of the great records and france's coach for george tripoli both back to back and he was out there and to walk on so we must manage the jewelry was very big problem you know we forget just how famous and you deal with alvin york's presence in the hotel which is another reminder a piece of tennessee history that many people just press over forget humming very proper name famous and film blunt talk about that that insert great pictures of york or on film producer even after your as a torn to like a movie a new york wouldn't do it even warner kept watch corner of his

slain many regional initiative screwball mall and fight in this guard convention to do it to end on and off in nineteen forty a forty one that that wonderful movie came out into a cultural that they would have a one of the premier is a national even than that went back on his word and so your kid one here chorizo what i read when i read the stories in the book that of the newspapers there a newspaper clippings and the two journalists for almost being one of the youngest richer he blamed being another rich now leading force and the administration of groaning wrote one of the key stories about that about the revitalization of the

auto and then started really so took a tour and to load i read his illnesses diabetes and donegal often been exciting place again she was an insightful portion she was and i think that when men believe that period for leo laporte martin and then this piece in which he tours north owns a rebirth is inherent in having done that the army didn't want it reading stories about the bar which is when about to close it down and he starts with you have brown in a lamar miller yeah i've been there a donut store where it was barbara had been there for for forty fifty years ago he didn't think you're so great but it was involved and they interviewed guest as

an unvarnished villain morning and serves them well as even unemployment down and if that's a lot of junk but they indeed were on the verge of a really what's next i know you've burned written and written and written a new made life brought national press back to the president so many times i know there is no book vitamin a state lab or tradition researchers i live here because i'm writing a history of the national the wind saved middleton say we started making fifty five and i it's tedious going through all those newspapers to find out what happened in the jewish and thirties well i do in that but between then when that comes out and now to another book out and it's called heritage how balls and hygiene and the subtitle is and it's probably it's going to be interesting enough to

our right now invite you to come by with another opportunity to recognize you in a totally different light well no i said ray you write this book that's i let you let that books it and after you died you let us on a really good night well everybody happy jack may storm a number of times and how pleased his father would be to be included well i know then they would be well when it calms you to come back out well thank you very much reserve bank of common they call you watching i just and overworking words keep ringing and then they are there and the moon as a use